The present invention relates to a motor vehicle structure, and to a method of making a motor vehicle structure.
The following discussion of related art is provided to assist the reader in understanding the advantages of the invention, and is not to be construed as an admission that this related art is prior art to this invention.
It is known to produce body and/or chassis parts in hybrid construction, whereby sections of a metallic base body are reinforced with a fiber-reinforced composite to realize lightweight structures with enhanced crash behavior. Mechanical and bonding processes as well as direct formfitting injection molding have hereby been proposed. Manufacture of hybrid structures is fairly complex because the individual components must be produced and then connected to one another. In particular when using fiber composites, curing times and bonding times have to be taken into account and adversely affect the cycle time of the production process.
Moreover, cumbersome cleaning and/or preparation processes are necessary for coupling metallic components with fiber composites.
German Patent Document DE 1 959 277 A1 discloses a method of coupling fabrics with glass fibers with a carrier material of steel. A matting or non-woven of steel fibers is coupled by a material joint with the steel carrier, using a welding or soldering process, i.e. a thermal joining process. Placed on the matting or non-woven of steel fibers is a matting or a fabric of glass fibers and impregnated with resin. Resin permeates formfittingly into the matting or non-woven of steel fibers and connects the matting or the non-woven of steel fibers with the matting or the fabric of glass fibers, thereby establishing an indirect coupling between the metallic carrier and the fiber composite.
A drawback of conventional coupling processes for manufacturing hybrid structures resides in the absence of maintaining an even joining gap when for example bonding or foaming the components to be connected. In addition, structural tolerances between the components adversely affect the connection as the attachments are inadequate and gaps can form between the components. This can lead to corrosion when used in the manufacture of a vehicle body part and thus adversely affect crash performance when a force level is exceeded.
It would therefore be desirable and advantageous to address these problems and to obviate other prior art shortcomings.